


Nascent

by Terminallydepraved



Category: Devil May Cry
Genre: Angst and Feels, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Study, Gen, Zine: Little Boy Lost Little Boy Found
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:54:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28110486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Terminallydepraved/pseuds/Terminallydepraved
Summary: Forsan et haec olim meminisse iuvabit."And perhaps it will be pleasing to have remembered these things one day."― Virgil, Eclogues. Georgics. Aeneid: Books 1-6
Relationships: Nero & Vergil (Devil May Cry)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 52





	Nascent

**Author's Note:**

> sup this is the fic i wrote for the Little Boy Lost Little Boy Found Vergil & Nero zine. i partnered up with my darling Yougei to do a piece on Vergil's time in fortuna when he made the choice to leave Nero behind and what might have been going through his head during that very moment. Yougei has already posted his art and it can be found here: https://twitter.com/yougei_/status/1338934475326013440?s=20 Please give it a look and enjoy it! It's super beautiful and you get the full image this way, not the cropped version the zine ended up publishing.

There was a certain bitter irony in seeking sanctuary in a church while bleeding demonic blood all over the front steps. Vergil skimmed the thought like a stone over water, the humor registering but only in infrequent, distancing bursts that disappeared in the wake of the ripples staggering his progress up, up, up. In one arm, he cradled a wriggling bundle. In the other, the Yamato served as a prop to keep him moving. 

Not much in Vergil’s life had ever superseded his grip on his sword, but somehow, the weight in his off-hand tested that prioritization. 

The nights in Fortuna were cold; a fell wind carried in from the sea ghosted through the barren streets to chase any and all back inside. Vergil shivered. Fortuna hadn’t felt much like a sanctuary when he had arrived, but it had never felt less safe than it did now. The howls of demons sundered the night. They smelled his blood, his weakness. It wafted off him in this state, and Vergil knew… He _knew_ he could move faster, protect himself better, if he left the child behind. Self-preservation. It’s what his instincts screamed at him to prioritize, just as he’d always done for as long as he could remember. 

But that was the problem, wasn’t it? The warring nature of his duality had reared its ugly head. The demonic whisper in the back of his mind was ready to cast off this child, this piece of himself he hadn’t known existed until just a few scant hours before, but the humanity itching beneath his skin kept his arm locked firm around the bundle, kept the child tucked against his side, warm in the bloody coat he had sacrificed so it wouldn’t freeze to death so soon after taking its first breath. 

Vergil put his back to the door of the church and stared into the treacherous night. He wondered which nature he should yield to.

He wondered if yielding to one would permanently bury the other. 

Vergil looked at the child nestled in his arm. He hadn’t seen many baby pictures from when he and Dante had been children, but this… Something told him that both of them had looked like this. Blue eyes, the smattering of pale hair still tinged red with their shared blood... The child clearly wasn’t human; its devil trigger covered it now, the demon within perhaps sensing how dangerous their predicament was. Tiny horns gilded the child’s head, hardy blue skin covering him—no, _no,_ he couldn’t get attached—covered _it_ from head to toe. Demonic essence emanated from the child like a heartbeat, and Vergil knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the demons chasing them would follow that essence like a beacon. 

“Stop that,” he rasped, giving the bundle a gentle shake. Blue eyes blinked at him silently. Vergil sighed. There was no helping it then. Vergil reached into the swaddling, fingers outstretched, and closed his eyes. He could read the waves of power like ripples in a pond. He whispered a spell and sent out a pulse of his own aura to force the child’s devil trigger into submission—but his eyes opened in a jolt when something warm wrapped around his finger. Just in time too, to watch as scales and hide retreated, leaving fresh pink skin behind. All but an arm. The arm that had lifted to grab Vergil’s hand retained its demonic guise. 

Vergil pulled back a little and tried again. The arm refused to change. “Stop that,” he repeated firmer, growing a little panicked. “Stop it. They’ll never accept you if you don’t blend in.” But the child just blinked, babbling quietly. It didn’t care. Did it… trust him? Trust him to protect it? Vergil looked out into the darkness, sensing their respite was soon to end. He clutched the child tighter and shook as he tried to decide what to do next. 

Perhaps he should have killed the child the moment it was in his arms. Wouldn’t that be kinder? He was no parent, no guardian. He’d never been able to keep himself safe, let alone someone else. It was hard not to think about his own childhood with this reminder cooing against his bloody, bare arm. About his own abandonment. It hurt more to think of Dante, of how Eva chose to protect one and leave the other. Wouldn’t it have been kinder if he had died? If he had never known that feeling… 

He looked down at the child. It would have been a kindness. Mercy. 

The child fell silent as if it knew where his thoughts had strayed.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Vergil rasped. “If you don’t have a voice, you don’t get a say.”

But those eyes kept staring. They kept staring, and Vergil… Vergil bit back a snarl that did him no good. The only enemy in sight lived inside him, the cloying coldness of indecision shortening his breath, tugging at the raw wounds beneath his vest struggling to heal. Wounds from the Yamato always took the longest to mend. It scared him, that pain. But the fear wasn’t new to him. He’d lived it daily. Hourly. 

It would be a _mercy_ to make it so this child never suffered the same.

“You wouldn’t know better,” Vergil whispered, his lips numb from the cold and shock. “You wouldn’t know half the pain this world would show you.”

But the child just held onto his finger tighter, and Vergil let his head thud against the door behind him. He had thought himself a monster, a demon, for longer than he’d ever let himself be human. If he actually went through with this… 

A cold wind overtook him. There would be no going back. 

Another howl from beyond the church’s circle of light. The demons were getting closer. 

Vergil bit his lip and tasted blood. If this were any other moment, he might not worry. But wounded, exhausted, and with a child in tow... Even if he managed to fight back this horde by some miracle, the next wave would be right behind. Vergil tilted his head and looked at the church steeple looming over them. Something ached inside him. Was abandonment kinder than a mercy killing? Given his own experiences with the former, he couldn't say he wouldn’t have preferred the latter. 

“There’s no good choice,” he realized slowly, looking at the infant suckling on the tip of his finger. There was no good choice for him. There never was. Did he have the right to subject a child to the dangers of his existence? Did he have the right to abandon it to the ghosts that still haunted him every time he dreamt of fire, Eva, and that graveyard? 

Vergil shuddered and forced himself to stand on shaky legs. The child finally let go of his finger but not willingly. Like this, so weak, there was no way for it to follow, to force him to stop—no, reconsider. It babbled at him meaninglessly as Vergil rearranged the blood stained coat around it. Vergil struggled not to hear it.

The child fit on the ledge of the doorway as if the architects of this city had known this would happen. Vergil couldn’t stop himself from fixing the tied sleeves of the coat one last time. The night was cold. He couldn’t let the child freeze before it was found. Something cold shifted around his neck, and as he bent over, the familiar bloody glint of his amulet slipped free from beneath his shirt. A small fist, scaled and demonic, escaped the swaddling to grab the chain. 

“Don’t,” Vergil whispered, tugging the trinket away. The tiny fist’s hold was weak. Breaking it though… somehow that was harder than anything he had ever had to do before. The child began to fuss, confused. Vergil averted his eyes, fist hammering the church door once, twice, three times. He turned away, made for the steps. If he used his aura and put on a show, the demons would flock towards him and forget about the child. Someone would wake soon. They would take it inside where it was warm.

He had just reached the bottom of the steps when a quiet, forlorn cry rose to meet his back. Vergil’s foot faltered, skidding against the stone. The child hadn’t cried once. Not in that alley, not to the scent of blood and fear and _confusion_ , but now that Vergil was gone, the child, it— _he_ wailed. 

The Yamato trembled, a line of shaking silver, as Vergil drew it. He closed his eyes. He deadened himself to the sound. The howls of demons were louder— or he could pretend as much, at least. The path fate chose for him was clear in those fevered howls, and the crying... 

Vergil bit down on his lip until it bled. 

It would all become a distant memory one day. 

**Author's Note:**

> hope yall enjoyed it! its not quite what i wanted it to be since my word count got cut in between joining and writing, but i did the best i could with the length i had. keep an eye out for more zine content from me, i participated in a V-centric fanzine as well and we should be allowed to post those pretty soon here too. until next time!


End file.
